by Jim Almy
You’d hope that what happens in January stays in January. Particularly if those memories include a loss on the opening night of competition, Jan. 18, when the Rat City Rollergirls League kicked off it’s 2014 Home Team season at KeyArena.
This Saturday two teams with an attitude, Grave Danger and the Sockit Wenches, each sporting 0-1 records, will face each other in the arena in hopes of creating better memories.
Grave Danger, league champions for three years running, are out to reverse their opening bout loss to the Derby Liberation Front (DLF) and will direct their attack against the Sockit Wenches, a team that dropped their first bout of the year to the Throttle Rockets.
The Danger-Wenches match follows the opening bout at 5:30 between the Derby Liberation Front, winners last month over the Danger by a 229-193 score, and the Throttle Rockets, who throttled the Wenches 219-128.
Both coaches have turned the page, looking at Saturday’s bout as a chance to get their seasons back on track.
“We had a tough loss last month,” said Wenches Coach Rani Khan. “We’re getting back to the basics.”
She was echoed by Coach Vito Ramone of the Danger who said his team has moved on from their last bout. “We didn’t dwell on it,” he said, “using it instead as motivation and to look at making some successful changes.”
Danger didn’t win their three straight league titles by being easy pickings. They’ll bring a tough bunch of blockers, anchored by Shorty Ounce, Muffstache, Trouble Dutch and Jerrica Kallio.
Blockers in roller derby do double duty, playing offense to get their scorer (the jammer) past the other team’s blockers while keeping the opponents jammer bottled up.
Keeping the cork on the bottle for the Wenches is a strong and athletic group including Belle Tolls, Sun Shiner and Kendle Bjelland.
But Danger has a crew of jammers not interested in being bottled up and who can put points on the board in a hurry. That group is led by Carmen Getsome, who piled up 71 points last time out, and K. Beezy, who tallied 63. Nehi Nightmare and Unshine added 59.
For the Wenches Megan Havok, a league transfer to that team, and Short Fuse, who moved up from the junior league, will offer both great blocking depth and scoring power. “They will jam and block,” said Khan, “but enter more often as jammers than the last bout.” In that bout Fuse scored 26 and Havok had 20. Penny Racer, with 39, and Rawkhell SqWelch, with 40, will add to the Wenches scoring challenge.
Coach Ramone said that his team is healthy, though some are getting over some winter sniffles.
“We’re ready to go. We’re not changing our strategy but we will change our approach and our line-ups,” Ramone said. “We’ll play in a way that will be more catered to our strengths.”
Get your tickets to Saturday’s bout TODAY at the KeyArena box office or at ticketmaster.com!